Justification of Ethnocentrism

Title: Justification of Ethnocentrism

Topic: Human Nature of Ethnocentrism

Source: Robbins, Richard H. Cultural Anthro. Student ed. Belmont: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, 2012. Print.

Description: Robbins describes an ethnocentric fallacy as “the idea that our beliefs and behaviors are right and true, whereas those of other peoples are wrong or misguided” (Robbins 8). Ethnocentrism is opposed by relativism, which states that no certain belief system can be judged or compared to one’s own. Robbins makes a point that if all humans thought they had all the answers in life, everyone would reach an “intellectual and social dead end”. While relativism seems open minded, Robbins explains that relativism has its own fallacy--”the idea that it is impossible to make moral judgments about the beliefs and behaviors of others” (Robbins 9). He describes this as being intolerable, because it would imply that every act in this world could be justified. The textbook offers an example of the Wari population, who believe in cannibalism. The Wari culture believed that their acts were justified by domination. The book then explains that in 1503, the queen of Spain declared that Spaniards could enslave Native Americans who were partaking in cannibalism; and then in 1510, the pope declared that Christians could physically punish cannibals (Robbins 9). Robbins then covers the idea of moral superiority, which then determines the outcome of cultural differences. 

Analysis: I was born and raised in Humboldt County, and because of that I have been exposed to a very open minded and welcoming community. If the definition of ethnocentrism was announced to the population of Arcata, I can say with confidence that it would be frowned upon. And yet it seems so contradicting to me, because the people who frown upon ethnocentrism are making the point to not accept it, when acceptance is what relativism is all about. Of course I do not perceive my beliefs as extremely educated nor am I close-minded, but it seems like ethnocentrism is more of a humanistic trait than humans would actually like it to be. A great example of this is religion; while Judaism, Christianity, and Islam all are heavily based on the roots of Abraham, some of the greatest conflict in the world is due to the differences between each text. As two different nationalities, Kuwaiti and Scottish, I have been exposed to the differences between Christianity and Islam my entire life, but neither side of my family has ever explained the similarities between the two religions. Instead, they criticize each other’s religious texts, when there are more common factors between them than differences. When a topic such as religion or a certain spiritual belief comes into play, believers take it very personally, because of the morals and manners that these texts teach, which assists creating an individual and his or her beliefs. It seems that religion has to do with the existence of ethnocentrism, because religious texts teach that their teachings are the correct ones, and therefore, many take that mindset out of religion and apply to everyday life, judging other’s actions. I am not criticizing religion or trying to generalize, I think the idea of religion is fantastic; I am just stating my opinions on where I think a root of ethnocentrism can be traced back to. When Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait back in 1990, he thought his actions were justified by Allah, and therefore, was confident about his decision to kill the thousands of Kuwaitis that him and his troops did. When it comes to relativism, I believe that it can be applied in many cases throughout the entire human population, but when digging deeper into topics such as religion, it gets more difficult to accept other beliefs as equal to one’s own.